Post 400

Amazing - the 400th post in what was meant to be a 28 day travel blog! Little did I guess how long it would be when I agreed to continue until we were through the Covid disruption! 

On Wednesday evening, after I had written up the report of our WES Group meeting, I went to close the balcony doors and heard a racket of 'Ark, ark" noises. It turned out to be 6-8 birds in one of the trees on our apartment block. Roughly half of them were black and half mostly grey. I assume it was some kind of territorial dispute.

The black birds were, I'm sure, Australian ravens. 

I wasn't sure if the grey ones were also ravens, or butcher birds. The calls were definitely raven calls, so I reckon they were all ravens.

It went on for a good ten minutes, with various members of the group flying away, returning, flying away again. This black one stayed put throughout and only left after all others had gone.

If s/he was defending territory, or holding his ground, s/he won.

The WES Group meeting went well. Members engaged with the issues around Viking embroidery, several bought some of Peter Sanderson's lucets to try and there were lots of contributions and questions. It's a great group.              

I had duck soup for dinner, using the stock from the bones of Monday night's duck and the bok choi I forgot to add to the stir fry. Delicious.

On Thursday my Pilates class was cancelled at short notice, so I was able to upload Conversations with Baby Boomer Teachers to the National Electronic Deposit website and fulfil a couple of other commitments I made to friends before doing a bit of shopping for Monday's family meal. 

I also worked out a way to finish stitching the Christmas gift that caused my wrist problem last week. I stitched it to a piece of cotton by overstitching the edges, cut the back of the cotton away in a cross shape and folded back the resulting triangles to expose the back and mounted it in a hoop. Now I should be able to stitch it without holding it. With a bit of luck the cotton mounting will be reusable for the other three pieces in the kit.

I haven't got to it yet, but will try it soon.

On Friday Susan and I sat and stitched, then we went out to dinner at Port Adelaide with other friends.  On Saturday I picked Brigid up from school when she arrived back from assisting at a school camp and took her to her Surf Lifesaving duty. We all met up at Grange for a meal. Niamh missed JEMS because she had two teeth removed. Katherine was at Synod all day. Busy lives.

The cards I ordered from Officeworks as an experiment were also ready and I picked them up. I'm very pleased with them. I called at the Guild to discuss whether the shop would like some. These are close-ups of the Agave plant at the Guild. I've now ordered some cards of the full plant. The Guild shop has rather too many cards already but I think some members of WES will like them anyway.

In the meantime, Conversations has been arriving for those who ordered a copy. The response is very positive. My brother, bless his little cotton socks, is organising a book launch dinner among his friends who participated, now that they are emerging from lockdown.

Sunday was my last formal Guild class for the year - Christine Bishop's Punto in Aria starfish. It was slow going, because there's no way around completing the whole edge before moving in row by row. In class I  almost completed the second- and hardest- row and moved into the needlelace at home. I finished it on Monday night. I thought I might have to make a box to put it on. Alison Cole no longer has the fabric covered boxes I was planning to use.

One suggestion was to mount it on an abalone shell, but it needs to be glued, so I think I'll give that a miss even though I have a shell. Then overnight it occurred to me that I could add it to the Kantha cushion I made a few years ago.  

I washed the cover this morning (a good drying day!) and added it this afternoon. The loops needed to be stitched down securely but it's a good result. Voilà! 

Looks like it's always been there, and belongs.

It's been a week of medical treatments for my grandchildren. Niamh had teeth removed, orthodontic bands restored and she and Veronica had their second Covid vac today. Fionn had an operation yesterday to reset an old break in his wrist which was not picked up in the scan when it happened a couple of years ago. His wrist will be in plaster and various forms of immobilisation for eight weeks - a significant trial and setback for a budding athlete. However, he's a determined and persistent young man and will come out strong.

This afternoon I finished the colourwork on the Leadlight Counted pouch. I've now got the borders and edges to do before lining it.

While stitching it I've been thinking about having some bookshelves made for my living room. I'm hoping to pay a visit to Nordic Furniture at Norwood to discuss my idea with them. It would be good to do something with the piles of books on my chairs and table. I also need to get rid of a cupboard I'm using for storage in my carpark area, against Strata rules. Looks like a storage reorganisation week coming up.